Boss Mick McCarthy conceded that Leeds United had deserved their 1-0 victory over Town and admitted his team put in a “poor performance” at Elland Road.
"Leeds deserved to win,” the Blues manager said. He felt there was little in the game until Chris Wood scored in the 35th minute with the Whites then dominating the final minutes up to the break and then most of the second half in which they might have added to their lead.
"I don’t think the second half started that way, to be honest with you, in fact I know it didn’t.
"But they’re a good side, they’ve got good players. I thought Chris Wood was outstanding today, he was probably the focal point and the big difference in the team because when they hit it up to him it stuck up there and he ran in the channels. He showed why he’s had good moves and is a good player. They deserved it.”
He added: "You have to give the opposition some credit sometimes, don’t you? We were poor with the ball today, really poor.
"Even the freekick at the end, I know Freddie had hit the target twice last week, but it was probably too close and we let them off the hook there.
"You get the one chance and we could have nicked a goal out of it. Whether it would have been deserved or not I wouldn’t have cared, but you’ve got to hit the target and we didn’t. That summed us up today.”
McCarthy was frustrated by his team’s display but says he’s not felt that way too often in the opening couple of months of the campaign.
"I’ve not had that many frustrations this season so far in terms of performances,” he reflected. "Brentford away in the second half. We were poor today, it was a poor performance. I am frustrated, I always am when we don’t play well.”
The Blues lost Adam Webster - "hamstring” - Grant Ward - "his knee” - and Brett Pitman - "ankle and knee” - to injury and McCarthy doesn’t expect the trio to be involved in the home game against Brighton on Tuesday.
"Probably impossible for any of them, I think,” he added. "Roll on the international break, I would say, so we can get some back.
"You’ve seen today what we’ve got on the bench in terms of back-up, we’ve got Josh [Emmanuel] and Myles [Kenlock], the two defenders. Josh has had to go on and he did all right actually, put one great cross in.
"And we’ve got Dozzer, Bish will be all right for Tuesday, Conor Grant. We came here with 19 players, we’ll be tipping up with 16 on Tuesday.”
Webster’s absence, with Tommy Smith already out having undergone back surgery, means skipper Luke Chambers is set to move back to his favoured central defensive role.
Having played at right-back so often in the last three seasons, does McCarthy believe it will take his skipper time to adjust? "I don’t think so, he’ll be fine.”
Town have scored only four goals in their eight Championship games since netting four against Barnsley on the opening day. Does McCarthy believe his team presents enough of an attacking threat?
"I thought there was at Brentford for a while, there was in that game,” the Town boss added. "Certainly against Barnsley we did.
"Aston Villa there was nothing until the last 10 minutes for either side. Norwich we had chances, Wolves we’ve played well and had chances. But it is a concern if we’re not scoring goals, of course.”
McCarthy was pleased with sub Leon Best’s performance, despite the 30-year-old having player more of the game - 65 minutes - than his manager would have wanted.
"I would have liked Brett to have stayed on for longer, but I thought he did well, Besty. I was pleased with him,” he said.
"He was a threat but he was a threat in a very difficult game. We didn’t get the ball up to him really or keep it up there. But he’s worked hard. I was pleased with him, pleased with what he’s done.”
Regarding 24-year-old Wood, who failed to score in his three starts and five sub appearances during his loan at Portman Road in 2014/15 but has netted seven times already this season, he added: "I don’t think he’s ripped it up here until now, until this season. You’re moving around all the time, having loan spells, maybe a move doesn’t work.
"I think you get deconditioned because you travel the team, you don’t play, you go back, you do bits of training. You’re treated a like a first-team player.
"I think that’s what happened to Woody when we got him. I was pleased with him just at the end when he was starting to get there and, of course, Leicester took him back.
"Leeds have got a very good player, he’s in great shape, he played really well today and his performance today has shown why people were coveting his signature a few years ago.
"And if he continues doing that then Leeds have got a really exceptional Championship striker.”
Whites boss Garry Monk, whose team has now won four in a row in all competitions, was pleased with the win but believed his side ought to have won by a greater margin.
"It’s very pleasing. I thought we did very well today," he said. "I think we understood the game very well, our planning in the game went very well.
"We understood that playing against Ipswich they were going to make us defend certain situations a lot and we planned for that very well and I thought we were excellent in that phase of the game defensively.
"And then offensively we created some very good chances today and my disappointment from the game is that we weren’t clinical enough, we didn’t make it comfortable for ourselves in terms of getting those extra goals that we needed to make it a little bit better for ourselves and give ourselves a little bit of breathing space.
"There’s always the danger towards the end of the game that one lapse or one moment could cost you and that’s always the fear, whereas really we should have been much more comfortable.”